Where are your Sales Coming From?

It`s about Mixing Up the Options!

1.     Social Media Engagement

Social Media is a great way to begin engagement with someone and has been instrumental in about 85% of my business (LinkedIn for me). Sharing quality and good content that is valuable to your potential client positions you as an expert but also gives you the opportunity to be the first supplier they think of when they are looking for products and services like yours. It’s not a quick fix but rather a very strong starting point.

 Advantages: Free, easy to use and great research tool to target the right people.

 Top Tip: Share real value consistently

 2.     Networking Meetings(In Time!)

A lot of people fear Networking meetings and I get that. They can be a bit daunting but very often the daunting bit is self inflicted as you try and meet everyone in the room, not come across as too salesy and still have time to ask the other people questions. At networking meetings it’s not about “working the room” and meeting everyone, it’s about meeting the right people. If you are going to networking meetings to “sign” business, you are going to be disappointed. However, if you are going with the attitude of opening up new relationships then you are on the right track.

 Advantages: There are hundreds of groups meeting every week so lots of opportunities

 Top Tip: Go with an open mind and set yourself a realistic target of no of people to meet

 3.     Past Clients

There is a wealth of opportunities in your database that you may not have looked at recently and that is past clients. Every business loses clients each year and for lots of reasons. An old client may have gone somewhere else but that doesn’t mean he is happy with that new place! You may have new and better offers for them now…Will you get all of them back? Probably not…Will you get some of them back? Very probably… Go back to old clients and just keep in touch. If you don’t ask the answer is always no!

 Advantages: They have done biz with you in the past so may be open to it again

 Top Tip: Set dedicated “Past Clients” time each month

 4.     Referrals

Referrals are the hidden treasure of sales yet so few of us ask for them. In fact, the stats say that 91% of clients would happily give a salesperson a referral, yet only 11% of us ask for them. Maybe it’s fear or laziness not asking for referrals, but they are something we all should be building into our presentations. What’s the worst thing that can happen? They say no! Nothing ventured nothing gained.

 Advantages: Easy to do if you come up with the simple and right way to ask

 Top Tip: Find a way to ask that suits you and build into every presentation

 5.     Current Clients

Our current clients can offer us ways to develop our business not only through current business and referrals but also through cross selling and up selling. Do you have other products and services that the client can benefit from? They could be from other divisions of your company and/or new things you are doing. Very often by offering these to your clients you can give them better value. To me if you are not offering these, it is doing your client a dis-service.

 Advantages: You are already in a relationship with this client

 Top Tip: Look for ways to create additional value for your clients

 6.     Past Enquiries

We all have enquiries that ended up nowhere. It’s worth looking at why this happened and how you can reduce the amount of churn. There was a reason why they enquired in the first place. How come they ended up going nowhere? It’s worth dedicating some time monthly to go back to these people. Worst case scenario is that you are increasing your brand awareness with them for the future.

 Advantages: They enquired before so there was some level of interest in the past

 Top Tip: Dedicate 2-3 hours per month to working on past enquiries

 7.     Free Webinar/Talks

Webinars and free talks are a great way to showcase your expertise and meet great people. Because you are not charging people they tend to buy into (excuse the pun!) you. Look to areas that you are an expert in and how your knowledge can help someone with free advice. Maybe follow up on the session with a courtesy call to continue that relationship. If you have that specialist area, then many networking groups or business associations will welcome you in to talk for free as it adds value to their members.

 Advantages: Easy to do and people like things for free

 Top Tip: Make your webinar/talk about the industry and not solely about your company

 8.     Warm Calls

The world seems to be against cold calling and I kinda can see why. If you are ringing someone you know absolutely nothing about and don’t have a logical reason for calling you are just spraying and praying. I don’t however think that ringing people is dead, it is very much alive if you ring the right people with the right product and have the right attitude. By doing your research first and understanding potential needs of that person then, this to me would be more of a warm call than a cold call.

 Advantages: People still buy from people and you can reach a lot of people on the phone

Top Tip: Approach making phone calls with a focus on the other person and a logic as to why you are calling and what`s in it for them.

 9.     Personal Contacts

We all have personal contacts be it in our phone and email address book. Life and business are all about helping each other so I would urge you to ask your personal contacts to help you…People like to help, and you can return the favour…What goes around comes around! It could be to recommend you to someone or just simply give you an introduction. I think people can be afraid to ask for help like this sometimes as it seems weak. I don’t agree as that’s what life is all about…Helping each other.

 Advantages: It’s easy to find people who can help you

 Top Tip: Just be straightforward as to what you are hoping to achieve

 10. Face to Face Meetings(In time!)

F2F is the most powerful way of building relationships. Yes, digital etc are great but if you really want to understand someone then face to face helps you achieve this far quicker. You also learn far more about someone and they about you when you meet face to face. When it comes to business, it has been statistically proven that you get a higher order value face to face.

 Advantages: You build relationships far better face to face and get more business

 Top Tip: Be honest with the other person as to why you want to meet.

 I hope that these tips are of help and will help your business develop…We all need to do different things now and again and maybe one of these will help your business.

 If we can be of any help at any stage, please do just get in touch.

Stephan - #TheExhibitionGuy

Dublin, February 2020

[email protected]

+353 86 7750420